Professor Michael Desch, the first holder of the Robert M. Gates Chair in Intelligence and National Security Decision Making at the George Bush School of Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University, will speak at Ohio Wesleyan on Thursday, February 16. The lecture will take place in the Hamilton-Williams Campus Center's Benes rooms at 7:30 p.m. He will speak about "America's Illiberal Liberalism."

Desch has held his current position since 2004, before which he was Professor and Director of the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce at the University of Kentucky. Prior to that, Desch was Assistant Director and Senior Research Associate at the Olin Institute. He is the author of "When the Third World Matters :Latin American and U.S. Grand Strategy,"(Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993), "Civilian Control of the Military: The Changing Security Environment," (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999) editor of "Soldiers in Cities: Military Operations on Urban Terrain," (Carlisle PA: U.S. Army War College, 2001), and numerous other publications. Desch also has published opinion pieces in

The Christian Science Monitor and The American Conservative, and appears regularly on radio and television.

Desch has been a staff member in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research at the Department of State, and in the Foreign Affairs and National Defense Division of the Congressional Research Service. He teaches courses in national security policy, political theory, and international relations and democracy and American foreign policy.